League of Legends – Raising the Standards!

League of Legends is a game of controversy, passion and very big on current meta. But recent champion releases paint a different picture than that of previous releases. Why is that exactly? and what vision does Riot Games have for the future of the most popular esports game in the world – League of Legends.

Here is a list of some of the new champions we have seen in the last 2 years:KalistaBardEkkoCamilleKled

KindredKaynAzirAmong some others

But what do these characters all have in common? They are all difficult to play with some advanced game mechanics involved.
This means that Riot Games is pushing the League of Legends difficulty higher for those at the top of the esports/LCS level of play/ While encouraging the older and cheaper champions such as Garen, Sona and Morgana to be used at the lower levels of play. With simple mechanics, these characters are much easier to pick up and play. But it is hard to encourage new players to choose Bard or Kindred as their first champion.
But why would the designers want to keep the newer champions difficult to play?

It all comes down to the player base itself. In order to differentiate the high end leagues from the likes of Bronze and Silver. There needs to be a gap in not only ability, but champion pools and champion difficulty. That is not to say that casual league gamers can’t play these champions, it is more that they will get punished for making misplays. Making it a high risk/high reward scenario. It also encourages the casual gamer to master the easier difficulty champions and game mechanics before picking up a difficult champion that requires a higher knowledge of the game overall.

The advanced skill patterns are definitely an eye pleaser when it comes to LCS and esports on Twitch and overall the character balancing is working out to benefit the league at all levels of play. Having more difficult champions being released on a regular basis means that some of the easier champions no longer feel “Overpowered” as they may have done with a smaller game-wide champion pool. Many of the more difficult champions also have much more efficient ways of dealing with abusive skills and advantages gained by playing the easier champion roles. The key definitely comes down to using those skills in the correct way. Correctly timing an important shield, heal or CC could determine the outcome of your next teamfight and is harder punished on the difficult champions.
Is it time for Riot Games to release some easier to play champions? With such a big champion pool already, it is hard to say. But more variety is attractive to new and old players in League of Legends and it will be an ongoing challenge to keep the earlier released champions viable. The community continues to get better and better at these difficult champions and the one bad thing about that is that it can push some champions to barely seeing any play.

What do you think about the recent difficulty of newly released characters?
Leave your comments and feedback below!